McConnell optimistic on budget deal

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, said Sunday the impasse over federal spending between the two major political parties is an “opportunity,” not a crisis.

“Some of the biggest accomplishments of the past 25 years have been when we have divided government,” Mr. McConnell said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

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“Rather than thinking of this as a crisis, I think of it as an opportunity,” he said.

Mr. McConnell said tax increases would not be a part of the ongoing negotiations between congressional leaders and the White House over the impending vote to raise the country’s $14.3 trillion deficit ceiling.

“There’s clearly not going to be any tax increases. The president knows that. That was settled last fall,” he said.

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David Eldridge joined The Washington Times in 1999 and over the next seven years helped lead the paper’s coverage of regional politics and government, Sept. 11, and the sniper attacks of 2002. In 2006, he was named managing editor of the paper’s website. He came to The Times from the Telegraph in North Platte, Neb., where he served as executive ...